


As Time Goes Gently By

by fandomfairytales



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, First Meetings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-05
Packaged: 2018-09-14 06:04:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9165349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandomfairytales/pseuds/fandomfairytales
Summary: I hit a wall with this one so i've left it where it is.





	1. Midnight

**Author's Note:**

> New years is all about new beginnings and surprises as well so it seems

Emma hated the thought of going to some crowded New Year’s Eve party, her idea of a wonderful new year was settling in with a good book and a cup of hot coco with cinnamon. She knew her friends Mary Margaret and David would be there, but she really didn’t want to deal with being social after a week chasing down skips who really proved why Christmas is the silly season. 

 

MM had however made some rather convincing arguments as to why she ‘just had to attend!’ so Emma compromised. Besides it would mean MM couldn’t set her up on any blind dates for the next six months (she had tried for the rest of her life but MM would never let that stand). So Emma was now digging through her closet for something appropriate to wear, wondering all the while why it couldn’t have been a pyjama party because heck at least she’d be comfortable. Finally, having found some cute floral dress she hadn’t worn in ages at the back of her wardrobe and feeling as ready as she ever would, she slung her coat over her shoulders and headed bravely out into the icy and ridiculously busy streets of New York city. Impossible to get a cab on a night like this Emma had already decided to walk the short distance to the address she had been given. 

 

Walking briskly to reach the apartment building, as she turned the corner she spotted the ostentatious pink coat Mary Margaret wore constantly through winter amongst the crowd of people heading her way. MM and David both greeted her with excited hugs and after MM had finished commenting on the fact that Emma had for once put on a dress instead of wearing jeans they walked up to the party together. It was like stepping into the most cliché New Years Eve party ever and Emma kind of liked the sarcasm of it. There were streamers and shiny cardboard 2017 cut outs hanging from every wall and from the ceiling, tinsel left over from Christmas hung haphazardly, she smiled at the thought of anyone a bit too tall getting caught in the web of fairy lights hanging up around the smallish apartment, there was even a disco ball and a strobe light. 

 

Emma was glad she had spotted a couple of acquaintances milling around the place, at least when MM and David would inevitably be stuck to each other like velcro, she would have a couple of people to talk to. Not that she wasn’t happy for her friends, she was incredibly glad her two closest friends had found each other: she found newlyweds trying at the best of times; simply because of the constant goo-goo eyes and the amount of times as third wheel she had to hear their stories repeated to anyone who asked. 

 

Wandering off to grab a drink she ran into Ruby who was busy mixing her own libation.

 

“Hey, so have you met the host yet?” Ruby asked with a wide smile 

 

Emma shook her head and in one swift movement before she even had time to comprehend what was happening, Ruby had spun her around and given her a little push towards the fellow standing behind them. He turned and Emma was stunned for a second but quickly snapped back to reality.

 

“Hi I'm Emma Swan... great party by the way” she stuck out her hand to shake his.

“Nice to meet you Swan…Killian jones, at your service” 

He took her hand but instead of shaking it he kissed it, resulting in Emma turning as pink as MM’s coat, made worse when they made eye contact. 

 

Ruby backed away shooting Emma a wink and she rolled her eyes in response. Making small talk with Killian wasn’t hard, he was incredibly sweet that much was clear and listening to what he had to say was easy considering he had a wonderful speaking voice and accent as well as an incredibly attractive face. He was pretty intelligent too but he had admitted pretty offhandedly he’d had a lot of bad breaks in the past; to which she could relate better than anyone. The party went on around them and the small talk shifted into a sparkling conversation between the two of them. Others joined the conversation but eventually wandered away leaving Emma and Killian to continue. Emma hadn’t expected to meet such a kindred spirit and found herself incredibly glad for MM’s insistence she come along: maybe he was the reason. 

As if she had known Emma was thinking about her MM seemed to appear in the kitchen. Catching sight of Emma and Killian she gave a little wave and made her way over.

 

“Emma!! You have to come and see this! David has had a few too many and he’s positively lost it, he blabbing on about this dream he had the other day about us all being fairy tale characters and you have to hear what he has to say about you it’s a riot!!!”

 

between giggles MM grabbed onto Emma’s hand and led her to a rather intoxicated David who was sprawled across the couch in the living room, speaking to a captivated and equally drunk crowd. Killian followed close behind mumbling something about getting it on film and Emma smiled at the thought. 

 

Apparently in David’s dream she was the long lost daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming; who were none other than Mary Margaret and himself respectively. Apparently she was also dating a very dashing Captain Hook in the form of one Mr Killian Jones. 

She had to smile at his current state but when she heard his story she laughed harder than she had in years at the ridiculousness of it and a glance at Killian proved he thought it was preposterous as well. 

The night dragged on and midnight drew closer. Killian had been swept away to deal with some conundrum or other and Emma had spent her time helping MM nurse David. Ruby had sat down and began asking prodding questions about Emma’s discussions with Killian and boy did that peak MM’s interest. All of a sudden the two ladies were fussing, scheming and planning on sneaky ways to push Emma and Killian together, all Emma could do was sit, nod her head, smile and try not to be sarcastic; especially when she was secretly hoping that should they attempt anything that it would play out as they wanted. 

Finally the time came for everyone to gather and wait for the countdown to New Year. All the lights were turned off and most of the partygoers headed for the window to see whatever they could of the fireworks. Emma was in the thick of the crowd and joined in when the countdown started.

10…  
9…  
8…  
7…  
6…  
5…  
4…  
3…  
2!   
1!!! HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!

Everyone around had seemingly found someone to kiss at the turn of the year but it was the fact that someone else’s mouth had found hers so unexpectedly that shocked her the most, she hadn't seen anyone close enough to even manage and in the pitch black she couldn’t tell who it was; much to her disappointment, as she was pretty sure this kiss was the best she’d had. unluckily she missed her chance to find out who it was when the lights were finally turned on, they had slipped away quickly...No words spoken, no leads, nothing… but she would be sure to investigate properly when the booze wore off tomorrow.

The night wound down and before leaving Emma made sure to put her number in Killian's phone. Not long after that MM, David and herself thanked their gracious host and stumbled back to Emma’s apartment to sleep off the night’s revelry.


	2. Lost and Found

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> new years day proves to be a great start to 2017

Morning hit and so did the hangover. She could feel the pounding of her blood in her veins and the hammering in her head. Getting up took effort but she went to check on MM and David who would be feeling it worse than she was.

Making three cups of coco with cinnamon and grabbing a couple of aspirin she walked back into the living room and gave a snoring MM a gentle nudge. 

“Here, this’ll help…” Emma murmured, handing her the aspirin and setting down the two mugs on the coffee table. 

MM sat up and rubbed her eyes which were black with remnants of last night’s makeup   
Grabbing the aspirin, she popped it in her mouth and shot Emma a grateful look 

“So how are you feeling this fine New Year’s Day??” the sarcasm dripped from MM’s words and Emma laughed quietly so as not to wake David

“Better than he will when he wakes up” Emma whispered, making MM chuckle knowingly 

 

Emma stood, righted her robe and walked back to the kitchen to grab her purse off the bench to hunt down her phone. But realising it wasn’t there, her stomach dropped a little. She tried to remember where she had left it in the haze of the previous night and to her annoyance, it was going to mean a very awkward encounter. Thank god she had left her keys in her pocket she thought.

David woke up eventually and He and MM prepared to depart shortly after. Emma got dressed and after they had left she locked the door behind her and headed to Killian's building hoping that he was there. 

 

****************************

Pressing the buzzer, she felt nervous and tried to talk herself out of it   
No answer; shit… She pressed again a couple more times and heard the speaker crackle. 

He had clearly been woken up by her insistent buzzing, his voice hoarse and low.

“who the hell is it, and why are you so persistent on ringing that bloody buzzer!!!” 

Emma’s embarrassment made her voice catch in her throat but she managed to get her words out clearly.

“its Emma, from your party… um… I'm so sorry to bother you… but, you wouldn’t have found my bag up there would you?”

the speaker crackled back to life and he replied in what seemed a much more excited tone, that he was clearly trying to suppress.

“Emma! I’ll buzz you in, just a sec…”

she waited and the door opened. She headed up the stairs to his second floor apartment. She hadn’t noticed how quaint the building was the night of the party, very old fashioned and romantic she thought. Emma would never tell anyone that she could be as corny as she was, but when Killian opened the door of his apartment in his old fashioned robe (which fitted both him and the aesthetic of the building and his apartment perfectly) all she could think of was that movie with Errol Flynn ‘The Perfect Specimen’ from the 30’s and god help her if he wasn’t a perfect specimen.

“Come on in Emma: I found your handbag, you left it under the table we were sitting at…”

His smile was amazing, she felt like butter melting on warm toast. He turned and led her to the kitchen and she noticed that he had set two mugs of coco on the counter. She picked it up and was hit with the cloying smell of marshmallow and the aroma of cinnamon. 

‘I don’t know anyone who likes cinnamon and hot chocolate… you are quite the anomaly Mr. Jones” she teased.

“I am equally surprised it is to your taste I assure you.” He replied with a slight smirk 

 

ugh! that was even better than the smile.

She leaned on the counter and he went about grabbing cookies from the pantry. She felt much more comfortable and caught herself feeling as if what was happening was oddly normal.

“So, how’s the new year’s hangover treating you?” He asked jokingly

“Better than its treating you, judging by the way you answered the door” she chuckled 

he ran a hand through his slightly dishevelled hair, lingering behind his ear.

“Sorry about that love, you’re pretty spot on. The buzzer felt like a church bell in my head.” 

She nodded, feeling bad that she had made him feel awkward but at least she knew the tell he had when he was. 

She realised then that she couldn’t think of another damn thing to say. She had all the time in the world to make small talk but she could feel the tension picking up now, like he had more to be guilty about than being rude over the intercom. Something was bugging him and she didn’t want to impose thinking maybe it was her; so she grabbed her purse from where it sat on the bench. She was about to make some excuse about why she had to leave to break the deafeningly awkward silence growing, but he spoke before she had the chance. 

“Love, I’ve something to admit, I feel terrible because I didn’t want to offend you but I think I need to because despite what my head is telling me, I'm choosing to ignore it on the off chance that you’ll understand.”

He had her interest now. He had it anyway... she hadn’t really wanted to leave. Setting her things back down she took a seat at the table and he followed.

Looking incredibly bashful he almost seemed to be unable to find words. The tips of his ears had gone red but it wasn’t embarrassment, it was guilt.

“I'm awfully sorry to have been so brash New Year’s Eve, I never should have been so forward to kiss you in such a state. You and I had been trying for most of the night to drink each other under the table and while I'm not trying to make excuses or retract my actions I offer a sincere apology for taking liberties with you.”

Emma had to supress how glad she was that A- she didn’t have to figure out who it was, and B- that it was him, and not some other sleaze that had been the one to kiss her like that.

 

“Killian, you don’t need to apologise, I kissed you back… isn’t that enough to put your mind at ease. It’s not like it the 19th century where you can’t kiss a girl unless you intended to marry her…”

she smiled and he seemed to relax a bit. 

 

“Besides, I rather enjoyed it if I'm being honest” she continued with a salacious wink.

what the hell was she saying?! Why didn’t she just stop while she was ahead instead of saying something so stupid?

“it’s still bad form lass and I apologise all the same” he replied earnestly

with a roll of her eyes she accepted his apology. Still kicking herself for the whole enjoyment comment. She only usually said dumb stuff like that when she had too much to drink. But it seemed his effect on her made her totally loopy and way too honest for her comfort.

She could feel the blush spreading the more the weight of how embarrassing her words were hit. Killian had clearly noticed, he had a rather odd look on his face, a weird sort of admiration. He reached for her hand across the table and reactively she took it. 

Holding eye contact, the air felt electric, Building to something. The warmth of his hand in hers was radiating up her arm and through her body, every nerve felt soothed in that moment and she realised that listening to her heart was already going to make her do something genius or incredibly imbecilic. 

She leaned in and kissed him chastely. Not wanting to start off too quickly she waited for his shock to abate and deepened the kiss when she felt him move closer to her. definitely genius. 

His lips against hers was like heaven, still holding his hand and knowing they were sitting close enough, she wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled him in and he held her tightly. Not even the sound of her chair scraping on the linoleum to move even closer to him interrupted, they were singular in their focus and only broke apart when the need for oxygen was too great. 

A couple of heartbeats passed and they rather breathlessly said in comical unison 

“wow…”


End file.
